stool raze its body black and backless. teeth taller than i'll ever be. its balance only suspect when dread creeps in. i hack off its legs to spite its knees and fall face-first into abigail. her banjo's missing drone string is all the proof i need that symmetry is an absence of excess. i strum the open strings. octaves and odd intervals. lemon and honey. i suck in smoke and breathe out a bonfire to warm the sunburned face of the man my mother married when she couldn't stand to be alone. his jackhammer hands. my mouth bursting with birds. our furtive feet, filthy and defanged. and so much rain still to fall, with winter waiting in the wings. 251022 what's it to you? who go blather from